AOpen’s “Mini PC” was revealed at Computex Taipei 2005, presumably to compete with Apple’s wildly popular Mac mini. It should be popular among PC users unwilling to switch from the Windows/Intel platform but desiring the convenience of a “miniaturized” computer – sporting the computing power of an average desktop PC, along with built in Bluetooth and 802.11 a/b/g support. It is also smaller by a few centimeters than the Mac mini. With S-Video and DVI connectors, it can be used as a digital entertainment center hub, but curiously, it apparently lacks a VGA connector, possibly alienating a lot of users with older monitors.

However, the components needed are expensive and beating the $499 base price of the Mac mini may be difficult, and analysts aren’t expecting the AOpen “clone” to be much competition for the popular Mac mini.

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This week I had a discussion about the impending PS3, Xbox 360 and Nintendo Revolution where I emphasized over and over again “We play the games not the specs sheet”. Having gotten that mantra out of the way there are some fascinating possibilities that this massive shift in computing and graphical power would bring to the video game world.

All businesses need to advertiser in some fashion sooner or later. Trying to gauge how well a particular product/service will do with any of these forms of advertising can be like predicting winning lottery numbers and trying non-mainstream forms of advertising can be a risky proposition.

How then can you hope to know what will work best before spending your money? MarketingExperiments.com aims to help you do just that by proving a place where other companies publish the details of their ad campaigns and their results. The site covers virtually every form of advertising you can think of and some you probably haven’t. The marketing experiments range from three to eighteen months and include budgets ranging from $4500 to $100,000+. The companies participating include some of the largest online names such as eBay and the Bargain Network. Details of the experiments called “Web Clinics” are available as Windows Media and Real Player audio downloads along with written notes showing budgets, timelines and other specifics of the campaigns.

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One thing that I thoroughly enjoy about being an Internet entrepreneur is that fact that as long as I have an Internet connection and my laptop, I can consider myself to be “at work”. For example, I am currently in New York City on vacation (I live in Seattle) posting this from a Starbuck’s in Times Square which offers the T-Mobile Hotspot service. This allows me to take a break from sightseeing, grab a Tazo Chai, and check my email all at the same time. No need to worry about getting back to the office! Anyone else out there take advantage of the unique situation us Internet business owners get to enjoy?

Nintendo just released WarioWare Twisted! their latest sequel to WarioWare for Gameboy Advance. This is a totally slick collection of more insane and surreal mini-games but with a unique human-game interface. There was the original WarioWare game on Gameboy Advance then WarioWare Mega Party Games for Gamecube, next was WarioWare Touched! On Nintendo DS and now back to good old Gameboy Advance.

Monolith Productions, keeping it promise to make it worthwhile to play The Matrix Online, has gone and done the unthinkable. They went and killed off Morpheus, the main sage in the Matrix and the captain of the human hovership Nebuchadnezzar. Not only is Morpheus dead in The Matrix Online, but he is also now dead in all the future works set in the Matrix Universe after the trilogy. This is because anything that happens in Matrix Online is canon and automatically becomes part of the Matrix universe.

Microsoft had to scramble to clean their South Korean portal recently and admitted the site had been hacked and booby-trapped to capture unknowing users passwords. The site has been declared safe and clean once again, but they are unsure how many users may have been affected. As always, Microsoft is at the forefront of the security scene!

Who says the Xbox is a computer in a box disguised at a video game system? Apparently, Brando’s shop does. So go ahead, and buy this: unplug the keyboard in front of you, unplug your mouse, plug this adapter in, plug your keyboard, then plug in your mouse. Now get to fragging.

The iPod photo update, rumored to be version 1.2 for now, will likely include Tetris and other games. Also, they will update the software with a few more add-ons like slideshows for your images and even games for your photos. The slideshows will likely include several visual effects such as fades, wipes, mosaic, and cube effects. No word yet when apple intends to release the update.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve encountered whiners that say they can’t play Halo against me because they lack a keyboard and mouse. Complain no more my newbies: Brando’s shop is offering this gem for you to take ‘em to school for a reasonably priced $25. It even comes pre-configured for the most popular best selling games out right now. Time to look like a complete dork at the next Xbox LAN party, so bring it on.